No Longer Weightless

            On Wednesday I had considered taking a couple of garbage bags full of some of my year’s accumulation of beer cans to the Beer Store at Dundas and Dovercourt on my way downtown to Staples to take back the memory card that I’d bought there on Monday for my Sony Cybershot camera. But it was already almost 13:00 by the time I got going and I figured it would be time consuming because of a line-up and the time it would take to load up those shallow cardboard boxes.

            Management seems to have gotten nicer at Staples. I had a big hassle with them several years ago when I bought the Brother printer that I still have. The salesperson had told me when I asked that I didn’t have to buy anything extra for it but when I got it home I saw that it didn’t have a power cord. When I went back they informed me that the power cords are sold separately. I insisted that they give me a power cord because I hadn’t been told that I needed to buy it at the time of purchase, but the manager refused. I wrote an angry letter threatening to take my business elsewhere and a few days later I got a call from them telling me that I could have the cord for free. The squeaky wheel gets the grease as they say.

            So on Boxing Day while one cashier was giving me my money back, another employee asked if she could look at my camera. She told me that the memory card I needed was something they no longer sell but I could get it at Henry’s Cameras or Aden Cameras. I thought about going there but Nick Cushing had already offered to order a memory card for my on Amazon, and I thought that might be cheaper so I decided to try that first.

            My next stop was Walmart, so I rode up to College and headed west. I locked my bike at the back where a lot of people were disobeying the sign telling people not to smoke within nine meters of the building. The first thing I did, as I think I always do when I arrive at the Dufferin Mall, was to go to the north end of the building and use the washroom. Actually have to pee pretty much whenever I arrive anywhere, including home. Am I instinctively marking my territory?

            After peeing I went to Winners because Winners was the place many years ago where I found what became my favourite drinking glass and which only broke in a fall a little less than a year ago. They often get odd items at Winners so though I’ve never seen it there since I bought it, it seems like a place where it might turn up again someday.

            I then went to Walmart and immediately went downstairs. The place was crowded and there were a lot of Spanish speaking people there. I walked around trying to find a bathroom scale but I also wanted a new saucepan to replace the one that I’d ruined, so when I stumbled onto the pots and pans I shopped there first. There were some empty hooks, so it was possible that the exact size of stainless steel saucepan that I was looking for had already been sold out. I wanted something that would hold my steamer attachment, which hadn’t come with my previous pot but which fit both it and the lid. Finally I saw one that looked like it was wide enough for my steamer, though it was not as tall as my old pot. It holds 2.8 liters and is 20 cm across on the inside. It has a glass lid though and a perforated area along the rim for straining things. It wasn’t exactly what I was looking for but the closest they had so I got it for $26. The next biggest thing was a two-handled soup pot but that was way too big for my steamer.

            While I was there I decided to replace my pizza pan, which I’ve had for decades but it’s about to split at the edge. The closest they had was a pack of two non-stick pizza pans about the same size as the one I had but with a higher rim and handles so that although the inside where the food goes is round, the outside is oval. I wondered about non-stick pans being safe but apparently Teflon is only dangerous at temperatures higher than my oven will go. I took it for $10.

            I finally found the bathroom section where I imagined they’d be selling scales and they were of course next to the toilet seats, even though there’s really no reason to keep a scale in the bathroom other than that being where one might be more often naked. They had quite a variety of digital scales but only one analog scale. The mechanical scale was less attractive. I went with the Hometrends Super Slim digital scale in silver for $20, though I could have sworn it was actually on sale for cheaper than that but I didn’t feel like arguing at the checkout.

            Upstairs I decided while I was there to buy some underwear and some tank shirts because I was feeling too lazy to do my laundry. I got a pack of six briefs for $19 and a pack of six shirts for $21.

            When I got home I was just entering the building when I saw my upstairs neighbour David walking up. I hadn’t seen him for several weeks. Benji told me David’s been training for a new job at odd hours. I told him that I found out that our rent increase notice is invalid and so we don’t have to pay. He handed me a little red envelope and told me to open it. Inside was a $50 President’s Choice gift certificate. That was nice. I can use it at No Frills.

            When I emptied my pockets I discovered that in my change from Walmart I finally scored a Viola Desmond $10.

            I unpacked my purchases and found that the pot that I bought fits my strainer with the lid on top as well. I like the glass lid.

            I tried the scale. It's very simple and there is no option for calibrating it. When I first got on I was 95.1 kilos, which is still overweight for me. It registers differently though on different surfaces. In just my sweatpants, a tank shirt and socks, in the centre of the living room facing south I weigh 94 kilos; facing north I weigh 93.6 kg; facing east I weigh 94.3; facing west 93.6; in the middle of the kitchen facing south: 92.9; north: 92.9; east: 94.6; west: 94; in the bathroom facing south: 94.6; north: 92.9; east: 94 and west: 95.4. I assume these differences have to do with how level the floor is. The only way I can find which spot would be best for weighing myself I’ll have to get something with a precise weight and find where it comes up with the same. The only thing I thought I had was a 2.7 kg bag of potatoes but it wasn’t heavy enough to activate the scale. I suddenly remembered though that I have a 4.5 kg dumbbell. It registers 4.5 very briefly in the middle of the kitchen facing south, so I guessed my weight is 92.9 kg, but I checked again and found that with even a slight movement in one direction or another the scale registers 4.6kg or 4.4 kg and so when I found the spot where it weighs 4.5 kgs my weight is 93.4 kg. So I’ve lost weight since I got weighed for my physical at the end of August but my BMI is 25.3 and so I’m still overweight.

For dessert during lunch instead of an eighth of a pie I had a sixteenth and I just had five spoons of yogourt instead of six.

I took a siesta and did some writing when I got up.

That night I had the other drumstick, some dressing, some cranberry sauce and half a ladle of gravy with a beer while watching Doctor Who.

Spoiler alert!

The Doctor’s friends wanted to see the coronation of Queen Elizabeth I but the Tardis took them to a town in Lancashire near Pendle Hill during the 17^th Century Pendle Hill witch trials. 

They arrive just as a woman is being dunked to find out if she’s a witch. If she drowns she's not a witch but if she survives she’s a witch and she’s executed. This woman drowns. Willa’s the granddaughter of the woman that drowned. It appears they are more like modern Wiccans and natural physicians than followers of Satan. The woman in charge of the trials in this town is Becka Savage. She owns the land.  The Doctor had tried to save the old lady and so Becka says for her to be arrested. The Doctor shows her telepathic identification and it reads “Witchfinder General” and so Becka gives in to the Doctor’s authority.

But there is a mysterious man in a mask skulking about who reveals himself as King James. This is the King James of course whose Bible is still used by the Church of England for some stupid reason. James shows himself to be obsessed with witches and immediately declares that the Doctor can’t possibly be the Witchfinder General because she’s a woman and so he assesses that the Witchfinder must be Graham. The Doctor says, of being a woman, “If we’re not being killed we’re being patronized to death!” James also takes an amorous liking to Ryan and flirts with him throughout the episode. I didn’t know this but it’s fairly well known that James had male lovers though he declared sodomy an unforgiveable crime.

Willa buries her grandmother on Pendle Hill but is grabbed by a living root. Yasmin fights it off.

Willa’s grandmother seems to come to life but she’s all mud coloured and some other dead women come to life in the same way. The Doctor discovers the possessors are alien criminals that have been imprisoned neath Pendle Hill for thousands of years. They are the Morax and their plan is to possess everyone on Earth. Becka Savage is absorbed as their queen and is about to have her king from the hill absorb James when the Doctor finds a way to reactivate the security system and re-imprison the Morax beneath the hill.

Becka was played by Siobhan Finneran, who acted for three seasons on Downton Abbey.

Willa was played by Tilly Steele.